Posted
by
samzenpuson Monday January 28, 2013 @04:06PM
from the facebook-and-the-rest dept.

redletterdave writes "A new report released Monday revealed that Google+, less than a year and a half after its public debut, is now the No. 2 social network in the world with 343 million active users. Even better for Google, YouTube, which had not previously been tracked as a social network until recently, is now the No. 3 social network in the world with about 300 million active users. Google Plus and YouTube are being used by 25 percent and 21 percent of the global Internet populace, respectively."

It seems as if this is what a lot of "Google+ users" actually are - people who use other google products which have Google+ integration that they trick people into activating. In addition to youtube they do the same trick for Picasa, instant upload on Android, gmail chat, and probably others that I am not aware of.

I actually like Google+ well enough, but I think their reports of its user base are greatly exaggerated.

Moreover, the idea that there are actually 343M active users on G+ flies in the face of everything most of us know about the network, which is that the place is a virtual ghost town.

That depends entirely on who you circle or -- more importantly -- has circled you. It appears to me that the vast majority of Google+ posts are not public.

Personally, my stream contains far more content than I can possibly keep up with. Only about a third of it is from personal friends or family, though. Most is from communities I'm a member of and various other people and projects I follow. If you're interested in Linux, for example, all of the major developers post on Google+.

For my usage, I much prefer Google+ to FB. The volume of content on Google+ is lower (but still more than I can actually read), but the quality is much higher. I dumped my FB account a while ago. However, my wife has maintained hers because there are a lot of people in our families who aren't on G+ so she uses FB to follow them, and tells me what I need to know. If I couldn't get that second-hand, I'd probably have to use both.

Moreover, the idea that there are actually 343M active users on G+ flies in the face of everything most of us know about the network, which is that the place is a virtual ghost town.

Au contraire, it's a very lively and information-packed place, with all kinds of content and discussions going on all the time, every hour of the day. But hte problem is, nobody is sharing anything with you, because you haven't circled anyone on G+, and/or they haven't circled you back. It's like going to visit your acquaintance Frank, and before even entering you declare his house to be dark, and then go around telling everybody that "Frank's house is so dark". Well yeah, it's dark you douchebag cunt piece of shit cunt, it's dark because you didn't switch on the light, shit-for-brains.